"Their best revenge, I take it, was in the cold you caught," laughed the prince. "Nay, Highness," said she, gravely, "no cold at all did I acquire. The maid-servants and thy divine, pitying princess rescued me. They changed my worthless garments, and urged upon me much hot tea and a small, sweet powder. Indeed, but for the trouble my clumsiness occasioned, I enjoyed more the falling into that august pond than the fishing beside it." Hagané smiled a little abstractedly. He did not laugh again. He turned to the table and smoothed the corners of a document. "The villa has no princess now, my child. In my many houses I come and go alone." Yuki looked upon the floor. "My spirit is poisoned by your sorrow, Lord. Forgive my great rudeness in mentioning. I did not know." He drew a short, impatient sigh. "The princess resides again with her own people in Choshiu. But these matters have interest for none but me. Hark, is that not the hour of noon now striking? I must dismiss you." She rose instantly at his words. He followed with more deliberation. She turned to the door, then wavered back to him, distressed evidently by thoughts she shrank from voicing. "Speak, child," he said kindly, "no mad haste is necessary. Say what you will." Still she moved soundless lips. In some inexplicable way she had fallen short. It was not only that she felt she had not reached his highest expectations, but, more definitely, she had failed to reach her own. Her acquired Americanism crackled on her, like a useless husk. She thirsted for new strength. Before her stood one able to give it, yet she could find no words to ask. "It is ten--weeks before I can start home, Lord," she managed at last to articulate. "I am only a girl, but I would die for Nippon, for my Emperor. What--what--" Again she faltered. Hagané took a small hand in his own and smiled reassurance. "Only the very young and inexperienced think it necessary to state willingness to die for a country. Give me the coming thought." "In these last weeks what can I do,--what can I suffer,--how shall I pray,--that I may make myself worthy of return?" The smile on the overhung dark face saddened into a look far tenderer than smiling. Yuki felt virtue, like a fluid, rush through her from his touch. "Keep always to the thought that you are Nipponese,--that you guard, in yourself, an immortal spirit, powerful for good or ill. Let not the tendrils of your outreaching soul cling to alien ideals, for, if so, each in the twining means a wrench and a scar, and the unscarred soul is sweeter to the gods. Think nothing of the body,--of personal desires, of personal reward. Say to yourself always, 'It is enough to be a Nipponese.'"